Self-supporting golf bag



P 1969 G. L. MUEHLHAUSEN 3,465,993

SELF-SUPPORTING GOLF BAG Filed Feb. 29, 1968 file-ones L Mus/11. HA USE/V,

BY iuzilubhit United States Patent 3,465,993 SELF-SUPPORTING GOLF BAG George L. Muehlhausen, RR. 2, Box 315, Logansport, Ind. 46947 Filed Feb. 29, 1968, Ser. No. 709,389 Int. Cl. A63b 55/04; A45h 9/04 US. Cl. 248-96 10 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE A self-supporting golf bag comprising a walking cane provided with a crook at its upper end and having secured to its shank opposite the crook a preferably cylindrical, self-sustaining receptacle open at its top and closed at its bottom, an earth-penetrating rod being reciprocably carried on the cane shank for movement between a position in which the lower end of the rod extends significantly beyond the lower end of the cane and a position in which it does not so extend, together with retaining means for securing said rod in either such position.

The present invention relates to a golf bag and the primary object of the invention is to provide a device which shall be simple and inexpensive in construction, relatively free from maintenance problems, light and easy to carry even when loaded and so constructed and arranged as to be self-supporting on the links. To that end, I mount a club receptacle and, preferably, a second receptacle for balls, tees and the like, upon the shank of an ordinary walking cane and provide that cane, additionally, with a stitf rod reciprocable relative to the cane to and from a position in which the rod extends significantly beyond the lower end of the cane so that the rod may be readily pushed into the soil to support the assembly in a substantially vertical position with the receptacles entirely out of contact with the grass or other earth surface.

A further object of the invention is to provide a novel means for supporting the rod upon the cane and for retaining the same in projected or in retracted positions relative to the cane.

A still further object of the invention is to provide novel retaining means and a novel arrangement of the rod with respect to such retaining means, in an assembly of the character under consideration.

Still another object of the invention is to provide, in association with such a supporting device, a novel form of club receptacle including improved separator means whereby the club shafts are protected while in the receptacle. 7

The above-mentioned and other features and objects of this invention and the manner of attaining them will become more apparent and the invention itself will be best understood by reference to the following description of an embodiment of the invention taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings wherein:

FIG. 1 is an elevational view of a preferred embodiment of my invention, parts being illustrated in section for clarity of illustration;

FIG. 2 is a similar elevation, taken from the left-hand side of FIG. 1, with parts of the club receptacle broken away;

FIG. 3 is a top plan view of the structure illustrated in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a bottom plan view thereof; and

FIG. 5 is a reduced isometric view illustrating the manner in which the assembly will be supported with clubs in the primary receptacle, the auxiliary receptacle being omitted from the view.

Referring more particularly to the drawings, the reference numeral indicates generally a preferred form of my invention in which a standard comprises a conlce ventional walking cane having a shank 11 and a crook 12 at its upper end. The cane may preferably be formed of wood, though it may be made of any penetrable materlal which can be drilled and, preferably, into which screws may be driven. receptacle for the shafts of a plurality of golf clubs is indicated generally by the reference numeral 13 and preferably comprises a substantially cylindrical body 14 wh ch is desirably formed from self-sustaining sheet mater aI and which is open at its upper end 15 and closed at its lower end 16. The receptacle 13 is suitably secured to the shank 11 of the cane or other standard, preferably by means of a shanked fastening element 17 which penetrates the cylindrical wall of the receptacle near the upper end thereof and penetrates, as well, the shank 11 and which is headed a 18 inside the receptacle and at 19 against that surface of the standard 11 which is remote from the receptacle; and by at least one other similar fastening element having a shank 20 penetrating the receptacle wall and the standard 11 and headed as at 21 and 22. The fastening elements 17 and 20 desirably lie in the plane defined by the axis of the shank 11 and the crook 12 so that the receptacle 13 is positioned, relative to the shank 11, opposite the crook 12. As shown, the fastening elements may be rivets, though in some cases it may be preferable to use machine screws or stove bolts and nuts to cooperate therewith. In any case, the receptacle 13 is mounted on the standard with its open end 15 presented toward the upper end of said standard and with the lower end of the receptacle spaced significantly above the lower end of the standard.

Within the upper end portion of the cylinder 14, a cluster of radially resilient, open-ended tubes 23 is preferably frictionally received and retained, as is most clearly to be seen in FIGS. 1, 3 and 5. These tubes may preferably be formed of self-sustaining plastic material and they are so proportioned and designed that each tube will receive the shaft of one golf club, the external dimensions of the tubes 23 being such that, when the selected number of tubes is forced into the cylinder 14, the tubes will be somewhat radially deformed and will press frictionally against each other and against the internal surface of the cylinder 14 whereby to retain thier positions near the upper end of the receptacle, as shown. Preferably, but not necessarily, I mount an auxiliary receptacle 24 on the standard. As shown, said receptacle 24 is formed of readily-flexible sheet material and is provided with an opening guarded by a slide fastener whose slide is indicated in FIG. 1 by the reference numeral 25. A stiffener 26 is associated with the interior surface of the receptacle 24 opposite the above-mentioned opening, and screws 27 may be driven through the stiffener and into the standard 11 to mount the receptacle 24 directly below the crook 12 and thus on the side of the standard opposite the position of the receptacle 13. Guide means comprising at least two eyelets 28 and 29 are mounted on the standard for a purpose which will appear. In the illustrated embodiment of the invention, conventional screw eyes constitute the guidemeans. Thus, the threaded stem 30 of one such screw eye is driven into the shank 11 of the standard at a point approximately midway in the height of the cane and the threaded stem 31 of another screw eye is driven into the shank 11 near the lower end of said shank, the screw eyes being so located and adjusted that the openings through the eyelets 28 and 29 are in vertical, spaced alignment upon an axis parallel with the axis of the cane shank and substantially midway between the fastening elements 17, 20 and the screws 27, 27.

A stiff rod 32 is threaded through, and supported in, the openings in the eyelets 28 and 29 whereby said rod is mounted upon the cane for longitudinal reciprocation relative thereto and for oscillation about its own axis. At its upper end, the rod 32 is provided with a lateral extension 34 which extends generally away from the position of the receptable 13 and which is preferably curved substantially about the axis of the cane shank 11, as is most clearly shown in FIG. 3. Preferably, the distal end of the extension 34 carries a protective, rubberoid cap 35.

At a point above the uppermost eyelet 28, I provide retaining means 36 for the rod extension; and at another point above the means 36, I provide a second retaining means 37 for said extension. As shown, the retaining means 36 comprises an upper screw eye having a threaded stem 38 and an eyelet 40, and a lower screw eye having a threaded stem 39 and an eyelet 41. The stems 38 and 39 are driven into the cane shank 11 in a common vertical plane angularly oflFset from the plane of the stems 30 and 31 in the direction of the crook 12, and the eyelets 40 and 41 are disposed in a plane which includes the axis of the shank 11, adjacent points on said eyelets being spaced apart a distance fractionally smaller than the vertical thickness of the rod extension 34. Thereby, because of the inherent resiliency of the screw eyes, the rod extension 34 can be snapped past those adjacent points either toward or away from the cane shank 11, by oscillatory movement of the rod 32 about its own axis when the extension 34 registers with the space between the eyelets 40 and 41.

Because the retaining means 37 will not be called upon to resist any forces greater than the weight of the rod 32, the retaining means 37 may, if desired, be less sturdy than the retaining means 36. The retaining means 37 thus may be, and has been illustarted as, a piece of spring wire formed to provide a base 42 which can be secured to the cane shank by a screw 43, and a pair of spaced lips 44 When the rod extension 34 is brought into registry with the space between the lips 44, it may be snapped past those lips, by oscillation of the rod 32, into the position illustrated in FIG. 2, and it may be readily removed from the retaining means 37 by turning movement in the opposite direction.

When the user of my golf bag wishes to move from place to place, he will engage the rod extension 34 in the retaining means 37, whereby the pointed lower end 33 of the rod 32 will be retained in a position somewhat retracted from the lower end of the cane, as shown in FIG. 2. When, however, he reaches a location at which he wishes to play his ball, he will turn the rod 32 about its own axis to withdraw the extension 34 from the retaining means 37, will lower the rod to bring the extension into registry with the space between the eyelets 40 and 41, and will then turn the rod into the opposite direction to snap the extension 34 between those eyelets and into substantial juxtaposition with the cane shank, where it will be retained against accidental dislodgement, by the inherent resiliency of the screw eyes. With the extension engaged with the retaining means 36, the sharpened end 33 of the rod will extend significantly below the lower end of the cane, as suggested in FIG. and in dotted lines in FIG. 1. Now, by exerting pressure on the crook 12, the user can force the protruding lower end portion of the rod 32 into the ground, the upper screw eye of the retaining means 36 being sufficiently sturdy to resist any tendency of the rod 32 to move upwardly relative to the cane shank. With a significant length of the rod 32 thus driven into the ground, the assembly will be self-supporting against any tendency of the weight of the clubs 45 or of the contents of the receptacle 24 to topple the assembly. Ordinarily, the user will drive the rod into the ground until the lower end of the cane comes into contact with the earth surface; but on a putting green, for instance, the careful golfer will drive the rod only deep enough to leave the lower end of the cane shaft above the tips of the grass blades, as suggested in FIG. 5. In any case, however, the arrangement of the assembly is such that neither the receptacle 13 nor the receptacle 24 will come into contact with the ground, either to damage the grass or to be dirtied or wetted.

While there have been discussed above the principles of this invention in conjunction with specific apparatus, it is to be clearly understood that this description is made by way of example and not as a limitation to the scope of the invention.

What is claimed is:

1. A self-supporting golf bag comprising a rigid stand ard, an elongated receptacle open at one end and closed at the other end, said receptacle being proportioned and designed to receive the shafts of a plurality of golf clubs, means securing said receptacle to said standard with the lengths of said standard and said receptacle in substantial parallelism and the open end of said receptacle facing toward one end of said standard, a plurality of eyelets fixed to said standard at intervals along the length of said standard with the openings thereof in aligned registry along an axis parallel with the length of said standard, a stiff rod threaded through, and supported in, said eyelet openings for reciprocation longitudinally relative to said standard and for oscillatory movement about said axis, first retainer means carried by said standard at a point between said one end of said standard and the nearest eyelet, second retainer means carried by said standard at a point between said one end of said standard and said first retainer means, and means on said rod selectively engageable with and releasable from said respective retainer means upon oscillatory manipulation of said rod, the parts being so proportioned and related that when said means on said rod is engaged with said first retained means, said rod extends significantly beyond the other end of said standard and when said means on said rod is engaged with said second retainer means, said rod does not extend beyond said other end of said standard.

2. The combination of claim 1 in which said first and second retainer means are angularly oifset in a common direction from the axis of said eyelet openings and said means on said rod is a lateral extension disposed in a plane substantially perpendicular to said eyelet axis.

3. The combination of claim 2 in which said lateral extension is curved substantially about theaxis of said standard.

4. The combination of claim 1 in which said standard comprises a shank, said means for securing said receptacle to said standard comprises an upper fastening element and a lower fastening element penetrating a wall of said receptacle and entering said shank, each of said eyelets is a screw-eye having a threaded stem entering said shank angularly spaced about the axis of said shank from said fastening means by approximately said first and second retaining means are secured to said shank at points still farther angularly spaced in the same direction from said fastening elements, and said lateral extension is directed away from said fastening elements.

5. The combination of claim 1 in which said standard is a walking cane having a crook at said one end disposed substantially in the plane of said means securing said receptacle to said standard, said crook extending away from said receptacle.

6. The combination of claim 5 in which the axis of said eyelet openings is angularly offset from said plane about the axis of said cane by approximately 90.

7. The combination of claim 5 including a second receptacle proportioned and designed to receive golf balls, and means disposed substantially in said plane and securing said second receptacle to said cane beneath said crook, the axis of said eyelet openings being substantially midway between said receptacles.

8. The combination of claim 2 in which said standard is a walking cane having a crook at said one end disposed substantially in the plane of said means securing said receptacle to said standard, said crook extending away from said receptacle, and in which at least one of said retaining means consists of a pair of screw-eyes threaded into said cane with their eyelets disposed substantially in a plane including the axis of said cane and With adjacent points of their eyelets spaced apart, in the direction of length of said cane, a distance fractionally less than the thickness of said lateral extension, whereby said lateral extension may be snapped between said eyelets toward or away from said cane axis.

9. The combination of claim 1 in which said receptacle is substantially a cylinder of self-sustaining sheet material and said securing means comprises a shanked element penetrating a longitudinal wall of said cylinder and said standard near each end of said wall, each such element being headed inside said receptacle and on the side of said standard remote from said receptacle.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,304,978 5/1919 Herrold 13558 X 1,502,300 7/1924 Fairchild l50-1.5 3,075,733 1/1963 Kimmel 248-96 CHANCELLOR E. HARRIS, Primary Examiner US. Cl. X.R. 135-59; ISO-1.5 

